Dark Sides
by TrafLaw
Summary: This love did not feel the way it was described in the stories she had loved to read as a child, or how she had always dreamed of it. Because love is not stronger than everything else. It didn't make the dark side of the other disappear, let alone rid her of the fear of destruction and downfall.


**To calm a storm**

It was just before sunrise as she travelled along the cold hallway. Her feet were bare and the high-heel sandals were in her left hand in order to avoid making any noise that could reverberate from the metal walls. A few more steps and she would have made it to the big door that would bring her on deck. Relieved, she quickened her gait.

"You're leaving?"  
>No, please no. Trembling, Nami took a deep breath before she slightly turned to the side and looked at the man behind her with an anxious expression. It was as if he appeared from out of nowhere, just like he always did in her life.<p>

He still looked the same as when she had left him. The hair chaotically sticking-out from sleeping, his face looking tired, not just because of the dark circles she could see despite the scant moonlight that shone in through the small round window. His upper body was adorned with nothing but his tattoos and some reddened spots; the evidences that neither she, nor he, had held back at night, her own body was also covered with the same marks. His jeans sat loosely on his hips. He seemed to have dressed in a hurry, because neither zip nor buttons were closed.

She shouldn't have sat down on his bed to look at him. She was only supposed to get dressed and leave immediately. Instead, she had let her fingers glide over his face to forever memorize every nuance, every unevenness, and every line before she had gently pushed a strand of dark hair away from his forehead. She had known that it was not a good idea. Every touch had cost her valuable time, and she ran the risk that he would wake up and could pull her back into the bed, into his arms.

"You can't go. Not after I've taken so long to find you, and to finally get you in my bed," he said firmly.  
>Her eyes began to fill with tears at his words. It hurt, what she was doing hurt her badly, but she knew she had no choice. "I can't ..." she whispered.<p>

Her reply was answered by a leer. "That's what you also said yesterday evening. And last night. Yet, I still had you moaning."  
>Yes, she had said she could not as he had begun to attack her neck with kisses and bites.<br>She had said she could not as he had carried her into his cabin.  
>She had said she could not as he had taken off her clothes piece by piece.<br>And she had moaned she could not as he had driven her to the brink of madness with his mouth, and let her orgasm continue for what seemed like forever.  
>The memories of their first and thus last night together caused her tears to finally fall now. It was the best night of her life and at the same time the biggest mistake she could ever made.<p>

She loved him, and she knew Law loved her too. Every touch and every kiss they had shared in the past few months showed her that. But this love did not feel the way it was described in the stories she had loved to read as a child, or how she had always dreamed of it. Because love is not stronger than everything else. It didn't make the dark side of the other disappear, let alone rid her of the fear of destruction and downfall.

"If you can't do it, then why are you crying instead of going?" He asked as he grabbed her by the hips and gently pulled her to his side. He let his right hand softly travel up her curves until his fingers covered her neck and his thumb brushed the tears away from her left cheek. "Come back to bed," he whispered seductively, before his lips wanted to collect the tears on the other side of her face.

But Nami knew if she allowed his lips to touch her it would be over. So she quickly turned her head away, and put her free hand against his bare torso to claim as much space as possible between their bodies, without pushing him away completely. For as much as she struggled against it, it just felt right to be held in his arms. She wanted to enjoy his touch as long as possible before she would forbid herself to ever feel it again.

His fingers that were digging into her flesh tightened their grip on her, his right hand forced Nami to look at him again. His face was no longer tired, but hard and unyielding. In his gray eyes raged a storm that threatened to destroy everything it touched. The same storm that forced him to hurt her. Which is why she had to leave him.

"I told you to come back to bed," he ordered, "And you should know by now that I don't like to repeat myself."  
>"No."<br>"What was that?" His hand slid from her neck up into her hair and painfully pulled on her orange curls to tilt her head back.  
>"I won't change my mind, no matter what you do."<br>"Why?"  
>"There's something in you. A storm. And as much as you try to hide it, when we are together... I can still see the darkness in you." He could not deny it. His coldness and his sadism were the remnants of his childhood and his time as a part of the Donquixote family that he could not escape as much as he wished, and tried.<p>

"You calm the storm in me." His grip on her hair faded as he softly let his lips slide over Nami's which drew a soft moan out of her. But she could not allow him to distract her. Not with his delicious lips or his strong arms, which were now tenderly wrapped around her body and caressing every spot on her back that was left naked because of her halter-neck top. But she had known from the beginning that it would not be easy.

"Law, I don't have the power to calm a storm. I'm just a navigator. But that's how I can tell when it's time to escape a storm and run for your life in order to survive, to experience a future."  
>She had hoped so much that she never had to tell him the followings words to his face and that he would simply know what her going meant. But now there was no escape from it. So she squared her shoulders as she grabbed his forearms to get him to remove his hands from her hair and her body. Her fingers ran along his skin, until they found his and intertwined them for the last time before she put a definitive end to all of it. "There wouldn't be a future for us together," she declared firmly as she pulled her hands from the intimate connection and focused her eyes strictly on the ground.<br>She walked the last few steps backward until her back bumped against the heavy metal door. Her left hand felt for the rotary wheel which would open the door, because she knew she had to leave his ship now. After all there was nothing more to say.

"You can be sure that if you leave now, I will ensure and guarantee you that you'll have no future."  
>"What?" Shocked, she glanced up at him. "You don't mean that…" But the look in his eyes let her seriously doubt it, because in front of her stood not the man with whom she had fallen in love, but the Surgeon of Death, whose reputation gave her an icy shiver running down her spine. Before she could think further, she opened the door to the deck and took refuge in the safety and comfort of her ship and bed. Because the last words he had given her to take along, let a discomfort well up inside her that she had never felt before.<br>"_Don't be so sure about it._"


End file.
